Iguanacaera

Iguanacaera is Martinique, a mountainous volcanic island in the Lesser Antilles. Its steep northern slopes and more broken southern hills stand between the Atlantic and the Caribbean Sea. Kalinago communities occupied the island before French settlement, which began at Saint-Pierre in 1635. Their resistance was followed by wars and the dispossession of much of their land.

French colonists established plantations worked by enslaved Africans, producing sugar for Atlantic markets. Rivalry between European powers repeatedly brought war to Martinique. Britain occupied the island in 1794, during the French Revolution, and retained it until the peace of Amiens in 1802. The French abolition decree of 1794 had not taken effect under British occupation, and slavery continued after the island returned to France. Britain seized Martinique again in 1809; it was restored to France after the Napoleonic wars.

The later city of Fort-de-France lies here.